


A Matter of Choice, A Matter of Trust

by bushlaboo



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Angst, Episode Related, F/M, Introspection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-08
Updated: 2015-05-08
Packaged: 2018-03-29 15:31:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,434
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3901471
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bushlaboo/pseuds/bushlaboo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post 3.22 (This Is Your Sword). Traveling back to Starling to stop Ra's al Ghul has given Felicity time to think. [Probably my worst summary ever.]</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Matter of Choice, A Matter of Trust

**Author's Note:**

> So yeah, this drabble happened. I seriously just want to write fluffy goodness because no two characters deserve it more than Felicity and Oliver; and yet, every time I sit down and write them angst ensues.

Traveling back to Starling City gave Felicity too much time to think. That was one of the detriments to being a genius; she could listen and help the team strategize their next move, while battling back her emotions and thinking about choices. So much of her life had felt out of her own control the last few months – hell, the last few years. Decisions were made without her input, her so-called promotion to EA, being a prime example. Then there were choices that were hers, but only if you fudged with definition of choice – _an act of selecting or making a decision when faced with two or more possibilities_. Oliver made his choice, of being the Arrow with no room for a life outside of the mission, and really that left her with no decision to make. She could wait for those dangled possibilities to maybe, someday happen or not; and she had already told him she wouldn’t.

Admittedly, she had dragged her feet when it came to moving on. She was not the type of person who could turn her feelings on and off. In truth, she was more like Oliver than he could possibly realize when it came to caring about people. She liked people, being social, though not in all normal societal ways. Before opening herself up to Oliver and Dig, Felicity had what she termed buddies. Groups of buddies in fact; work buddies, hacker (though she was not fond of that term) buddies, MIT buddies, the causal we run into each other at coffee shop buddies. She liked these people, and they knew parts of her, but none of them were what you’d call close and personal friends. After her father and Cooper, Felicity made sure to keep distance between herself and the people around her; and those she allowed in close during her MIT years, like Myron, she managed to enforce a distance.

She wouldn’t have to worry about losing someone she cared about again, feeling that pain and possibly worse the guilt; if she never allowed anyone to get that close again. So she had her buddies. A world of people who colored her life, who kept her from being alone, but none of who truly mattered.

Then she met Oliver Queen with his ridiculous lies and beautiful troubled, sad blue eyes. His last name got him in the door, and she swore she’d only help that one time and then be done with him. But then Walter asked for her help and Oliver kept coming back to her with lame stories and interesting puzzles, and well, mysteries needed to be solved. Not only did she enjoy cracking the problems set forth by both men, she found pride in being asked and relied upon. Perhaps that’s how they slipped through her defenses … made her care, made her want more than a buddy, but an actual friend.

Once she found herself wanting that, a deeper connection with people, the more of them she had: Oliver, Walter, Dig, Detective Lance, Roy, Sara, Lyla, Barry, Catlin, Cisco, Iris, Ray, Laurel, and Thea. She kept collecting people, people who could very well break her heart if she lost them, and the crazy thing was – at least for her – she was no longer trying to stop herself from pulling them in close and offering them everything she had.

For years she lived disconnected and she’d been content, but it wasn’t until she opened herself up again – and God, had she been hurt in the process – that she was truly happy; even when she’d been miserable. Even her genius level IQ had trouble reconciling that concept, but it was the truth … or at least it was her truth. When she left Oliver standing in the hospital corridor and again in the alley months later, her heart aching, she’d been miserable; but at the same time so grateful to know that she had the capacity for such feelings within her.

Of course it seemed like her choice – and yes it was decision, a conscious one made every day, because Felicity did not believe in the saying “you can't help who you fall in love with” – of loving Oliver came with a whole lot of suck. It came with the knowledge that he would risk his life on a nightly basis, that she would have to witness him in physical and emotional pain over his past and the decisions he had to make in the crusade to save Starling, and that no matter how much he loved her, she would never be first in his life.

 _“But I do know two things – the first is that whoever I am, I am someone who will do whatever – **whatever** – it takes to save my sister.”_

_“And the second thing?”_

_“I love you.”_

Right now the biggest piece of suck was the League of Assassin and their plan to wipe Starling off the map, followed closely by his probable betrayal (fake killing them wasn’t so bad, she’d drugged him after all, but kidnapping Lyla and leaving Sara alone – yeah, that was a bitter pill that she knew Diggle could not swallow and well, she hadn’t given herself time to consider if she could or not), oh yeah, and his new wife. Not to mention trusting Malcom Merlyn of people, and giving them no choice but to work with the sociopathic liar.

Yes, it would definitely be easier to forgive him for marrying Nyssa than opening up their team to Merlyn’s influence. And, did that technically make her a mistress? Or would that only be the case if they were together, because they felt like they’d always be together, no matter what, when she left Nanda Parbat the first time. Of course that was before the great Al Sah-him debacle. Before she convinced herself that her Oliver wouldn’t have – no couldn’t have – done what he did. She knew better now and Felicity wasn’t sure where that left them.

She hated what he did, even if she could understand his reasons. And, that was never really a problem for her, knowing that no matter how desperate a thing Oliver did, there was always a motive behind it. Not necessarily a good one, but one that he felt in that moment left him with no other move to make. In the past that had been enough, even if she could not condone his decision, she could accept the fact that he made it.

Now though … he’d taken the choice away from them. And it wasn’t the first time he’d done it. _“If you’re not leaving, I’m not leaving.”_ She had told him that once and he accepted it. Somewhere along the way he’d stop accepting that she had the right to make her own choices and started making them for her.

So even if she swallowed the pill – accepted his truly inane choice to put on the mask of Al Sah-him to stop Ra's al Ghul and everything that happened because of it, Felicity wasn’t certain that she could rely him to let her make her choices, because her choices would have been so different from his. They wouldn’t have walked away from each other after Zytle blew up their date or after Sara's death. She would have pulled him closer and maybe then he would have looked for another way when the League came calling for the head of Sara’s killer. Maybe the whole ascension to Ra’s could have been avoided.

It was a lot of maybes and what ifs that were pointless anyhow because that’s not what happened. There were no do-overs in life and she had a very important decision to make. In spite of everything she still loved Oliver Queen and accepted that he would do whatever it would take to save the people and city he cared about. She still believed in his mission and in him. And, she knew he would always be willing to sacrifice everything to save Starling.

But was she willing to be sacrificed? Especially if not given a choice in the matter. Choice had another definition: _the opportunity or power to choose between two or more possibilities_. Could it even be considered choice if he took the opportunity of making it away from her? Could she trust that in the future he would accept that it was her life and her choice?

Because she needed that. More than needing to know that he wouldn’t make unilateral decisions on the important things in **_their_** life, she needed to trust him to do that and right now … Felicity Smoak was all out of trust.


End file.
